BarkingDogs.net

The Deleterious Impact of Exposing People to Noise

Health Deteriorates as Emotional Distress is Fostered and Functioning is Impaired
This link will take you to the index of a website that features noise-related information provided by the World Health Organization. Once there, click on Adverse health effects of noise. There you will learn that intrusive sound, like that of a barking dog, constitutes a potent stressor that can result in increased blood pressure, essential hypertension, increased heart rate, ischemic heart disease, headaches, nausea, an altered blood flow, changes in blood viscosity and blood lipids, and shifts in electrolyte balance, along with elevations in gastrointestinal motility. In addition, according to WHO, exposure to noise increases drug use, fosters substance abuse, and promotes anxiety, stress, irritability, depression, aggression, interpersonal conflict, and sexual impotency.

Understanding Systemic Noise Truama
Written by the Barking Dogs Webmaster, this page will tell you how and why noise injures people and under what circumstance noise trauma occurs. In addition, it contains an explanation of why some people are traumatized by noise while others are not.

Poster: The Symptoms & Side Effects of Force-Feeding Noise into the Domestic Environment
This link will take you to the Noise Exposure Chart subsection, where, along with an explanatory page, you will find a chart, created by the Barking Dogs Webmaster, that lists the symptoms and side effects of chronic noise on those who suffer with it being forcibly projected into their homes, from the immediate impact to the end organ damage that often stems from long-term exposure.

Debilitation Sets In as Every Aspect of Domestic Life is Degraded
Also written by the Barking Dogs webmaster, this page provides an overview of how chronic barking and other intrusive noise impacts the health, happiness, and general functioning of those exposed to it.

Illness and Emotional Distress are Potentiated
The United States Environmental Protection Agency Office of Noise Abatement and Control published this article that cites noise as a significant contributing factor to heart and circulatory disease, as well as possibly serving to impair immune function. It goes on to discuss the psychological impact of chronic noise, including an examination of the process by which annoyance over noise can result in extreme emotional responses accompanied by equally extreme behavior.

Health and Well-Being Are Imperiled
By studying the impact that chronic noise has on people in hospitals, researchers from Johns Hopkins University have drawn some important conclusions that can be extrapolated to those subjected to the noise of chronic barking. The Johns Hopkins team concluded that, among hospital patients exposed to varying degrees of noise, that the extent to which the people suffered rose and fell right along with the noise level, as did their blood pressure. They also found that noise contributes to errors, interferes with healing and recovery, and has the potential to trigger Inflammatory responses. However, that should come as no surprise since European studies, also cited in the article, found that exposure to high noise levels increases the risk of heart attack by 50% for men and by 75% for women.

Heart Attack Risk is Significantly Increased
Researchers from the Institute for Social Medicine conducted a research study that demonstrated a clear, mild-to-moderate link between exposure to chronic noise and your likelihood of experiencing a heart attack. Remarkably, the research team found evidence to show that, even if noise does not annoy you, it may still be hurting you.

Sleep is Disrupted, Possibly Leading to Severe Physical as Well as Emotional Impairment
The British Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine published research with implications for everyone kept awake by noise. Their study clearly indicates that by allowing your barking dog to interrupt your neighbor's sleep, you may be impacting his judgment, impairing his coordination, slowing his reaction time, and dramatically increasing the chances that he will meet death or injury on the highway. Moreover, the British Medical Association has warned that, by allowing your barking dog to disrupt your neighbor's sleep, or by disrupting his sleep through any means for that matter, you are also greatly increasing the chances that his days will be marred by psychological suffering as he is overtaken by acute stress, anxiety, and depression.

When sleep is Disturbed, Risk of Stroke and Heart Attack is Increased Significantly
According to The European Heart Journal, the sound of a barking dog, or other noise, or anything else that reduces the amount of sleep you get to less than seven hours per night, greatly increases the chances that you will suffer a stroke, and/or a heart attack.

Stress Develops, Further Imperiling Health
Researchers from Sydney's Garvan Institute published a study in the Journal of Experimental Medicine showing that stress often results in the release of a hormone called neuropeptide Y (NPY). NPY serves to prevent the human immune system from functioning properly, which can result in colds, flu, and even cancer. We know from other empirical research cited on this page that noise creates stress. Now we know that stress fosters illness. Thus, all doubt has been removed. Prolonged exposure to noise, like that of a barking dog, can make you very sick.

Violence and Rancor are Frequently Generated
One of the most pernicious side effects of exposing people to chronic barking is the rancor and violence that so frequently follow. In an effort to demonstrate that phenomena, we have created this link which will take you to the Barking Dog News, where you will find stories of violent posturing, murder and mayhem that resulted when unworkable "anti-barking" laws forced people to square off with their neighbors - and try to settle it themselves.

The Health Effects of Environmental Noise - Other than Hearing Loss
Published by the Australian government, this 2004 document shows that the folks Down Under have come to understand the health risks that our ever present acoustic blight now poses to modern man.

This page is the index of Section Seven:
the Harm section of barkingdogs.net